LAS VEGAS – An ex-champ-vs.-ex-champ, all-UFC-of-Famer main event that was 11 years in the making lasted just six minutes as Randy Couture topped fellow MMA trailblazer Mark Coleman via second-round stoppage at Saturday’s “UFC 109: Relentless” event.

It was just the type of win that could put the 46-year-old Couture back in the UFC’s light-heavyweight title picture.

UFC 109, which aired on Spike TV (two preliminary fights) and pay-per-view (main card), took place at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas.

Coleman, fighting for the first time since an upset of Stephan Bonnar at UFC 100 brought him back into relevancy, was battered with strong right punches and uppercuts in the first round and then a takedown and ground and pound in the second.

Just a minute into that second frame, Couture earned the takedown – despite Coleman’s initial attempts at grabbing the fence to stay upright – and then softened him with a brutal ground-and-pound assault from the mount. Once Coleman gave up his back, Couture slapped on a deep rear-naked choke, though his opponent refused to tap out.

Instead, Coleman went unconscious and prompted the referee’s intervention at the 1:09 mark of the round.

Couture vs. Coleman originally was expected to take place more than a decade ago when both competitors were in their mid-30s. But an injury forced Couture out of UFC 17, and both men would eventually have to come out of short-lived retirements.

Fighting in his 40s has proven a better fit for Couture.

“I feel like I’m improving each and every time I get out here,” said Couture, who appropriately entered the cage with Ted Nugent’s anthem “Strangehold” playing. “This is my third fight in seven months, and it feels good to be so active. (I’m) 46 years young.”

Coleman, meanwhile, simply had no answer for the one-sided beatdown.

“The guy’s tough,” said Coleman, who was briefly distracted by (and later challenged) a ringside Tito Ortiz after the fight. “The guy’s real tough. I don’t know what the hell happened. I’m disappointed. I think I can do better.

But the 45-year-old fighter isn’t ready to hang up his gloves just yet.

“I’m not quitting,” he said. “I’ll be back. … I just need to train harder.”

Although UFC president Dana White hinted at a possible title-shot for the fight’s winner, the proclamation could have simply been the head honcho’s way of drumming up interest for the fight. Regardless, Couture moves to 18-10 (15-7 UFC) with the win and should – at minimum – meet a fellow top contender in his next bout.

Coleman, meanwhile, drops to 16-10 (7-5 UFC)

In the evening’s co-main event, middleweight Chael Sonnen made a whole lot of Republicans happy.

With country music announcing his entry into perhaps the most crucial fight of his career, Sonnen had talked his way into a corner leading into his fight with Nate Marquardt.

He dissed middleweight champion Anderson Silva, Mark Coleman, and anyone else he felt like. He would win at Saturday’s “UFC 109: Relentless” event at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas, or he would look pretty foolish.

Sonnen had faltered at crucial moments before. In a 2007 fight with Paulo Filho for the WEC middleweight belt, he dominated the fight in every range and saw the belt slip through his hands when Filho submitted him in the final seconds of the second round.

But Sonnen would not falter on Saturday.

From the opening bell, the Oregonian made it clear that he is a force to be reckoned with when on point and used his wrestling pedigree to dominate Marquardt for the majority of their 15 minutes together.

Marquardt just didn’t have a chance to exert his well-publicized advantage on the feet. The second he planted, he was on his back.

From there, Sonnen punished the Greg Jackson-trained fighter every which way he could and unloaded elbows short and long inside the guard.

Early on, Marquardt got back to his feet and nearly took Sonnen’s head off with a flying knee. But Sonnen ate it and went right back to what he was doing.

It was a grind. Coleman would be proud.

Sonnen did, however, take an elbow from top position that sliced his forehead open. It started as a stream and turned into a spigot.

“It was horrible,” Sonnen said later in the cage. “He hurt me early on. I just had to hang in there. I was scared that was going to stop the fight.”

Matt Lindland, Sonnen’s cornerman, told his fighter to bury his head in Marquardt’s body and keep doing what he was doing (with a lot of expletives for good measure).

And Sonnen would have a final gauntlet to run. After nearly catching another flying knee in the third round, he found himself caught in a guillotine that etched a grimace across his face. Marquardt squeezed with all his might.

Sonnen survived – barely.

Marquardt took advantage of the momentum shift and reversed while pounding away from top position as the fight slipped away. Waiting for the decision afterward, he apologized to the camera.

All three judges gave Sonnen 30-27 scores and cemented his status as the next middleweight contender.

“I let him take control of the takedowns, and that was the key,” Marquardt (29-9-2 MMA, 8-3 UFC)said. “I got caught trying to slug with him, and that gave him the opening to shoot.”

In the evening’s third main-card bout, welterweight Mike Swick became the second American Kickboxing Academy fighter to experience fast-rising contender Paulo Thiago‘s power first hand.

Swick aimed at a fill-in revenge for AKA teammate Josh Koscheck; “Kos” was forced to withdraw from UFC 108 and a rematch with Thiago due to an injury suffered in training.

Swick nearly got the revenge he sought while plastering Thiago with his right hand several times in early exchanges. Thiago’s chin was dangerously upright in the exchanges, and Swick cornered him several times. But Thiago escaped each time without suffering any serious damage.

Then, in the second round, the Brazilian showed why his power is to be respected.

Seconds after Swick clipped him with a straight right, Thiago countered Swick’s subsequent charge with a glancing right hook. The shot put Swick on the ground and scrambling for his wits. As he rolled to his side, Thiago used his underhook against him and put Swick to sleep with a D’arce choke at the 1:54 mark of the second frame.

Following the win, Thiago said he had no problem changing his gameplan for Koscheck to meet the problems Swick presented.

“They changed one tough fighter for another,” Thiago said. “I had a couple of little adjustments, but nothing big.

“I’m ready to fight whoever the UFC puts up against me.”

After an impressive four-fight win streak saw him rise to the top of the division, Swick (14-4 MMA, 9-3 UFC) has now dropped two consecutive fights for the first time in his career. Meanwhile, Thiago (13-1 MMA, 3-1 UFC) finishes his tour of AKA’s standout welterweights with a 2-1 record and should now see fights with top 170-pounders from other camps.

Maia edges Miller; Serra stops Trigg

A different Demian Maia showed up against Dan Miller at UFC 109.

The 2007 Abu Dhabi champion and UFC middleweight did not bulrush Miller to the mat. With Junior Dos Santos’ coach Luiz Dorea and Wanderlei Silva’s former coach Rafael Alejarra in his corner, Maia clearly wanted to give the stand-up game another chance after a brutal 21-second knockout at the hands of Marquardt this past August.

Although his punches never hurt Miller, Maia stayed persistent in stand-up exchanges and varied his attack early on.

Miller, likely expecting a quick shot from Maia, did not fully let his hands go for fear of winding up on his back. He did once in the first round and spent a quick spell on his back against the cage.

But when Maia later popped Miller with a knee south of the border and landed a handful of punches as referee Steve Mazzagatti disregarded his call for a stoppage, Miller got the message.

With the ghost clear, the IFL veteran strode comfortably into exchanges and tried to take Maia’s legs from him with kicks. On several occasions, Miller caught the submission ace being lazy and landed his straight right. Unlike August, though, Maia didn’t go down.

Still, most of the exchanges were fruitless for both competitors. The audience tired of the tactical stalemate and greeted the fight’s second half with boos.

In the final frame, Maia shot straight for the takedown, and unlike earlier performances, found it difficult to maneuver for submissions against the cage. With Miller’s legs blocking his advance, he could only chop away with his right hand.

All in all, the quantity of Maia’s strikes outweighed Miller’s quality.

The boos were generous when Bruce Buffer announced that Maia (12-1 MMA, 6-1 UFC) earned the unanaimous-decision win over Miller (11-3 MMA, 3-2 UFC). The Brazilian apologized to fans afterward.

“I think my boxing’s not the best, but I can do it,” he said. “It was my choice to fight stand up before the ground, to make it harder on him.”

The evening’s main-card opening contest featured a bout most observers viewed as a “loser leaves town” matchup. With that in mind, welterweight Matt Serra likely gave Frank Trigg his UFC walking papers with a first-round knockout victory.

Serra, the fireplug New Yorker, walked to the cage as the theme to “Rocky” played on the speakers, and his performance mirrored the fictional “Italian Stallion” in attack. Serra overcame his height and reach disadvantage in barrelling his way into exchanges with his head down. Like “Rocky,” Serra drew first blood by going to the body.

Trigg, sniping at Serra with straight, downward punches, caught several of the shots in the gut and simply couldn’t pull the trigger to return fire beyond the first exchange.

“My power comes from being so stocky,” Serra said of his body shots after the win. “I wanted to work the body and make my way up there.”

Serra did just that. After establishing a successful attack to the body, Serra clipped Trigg on the chin with an overhand right, which sent the two-time welterweight contender to the mat.

With three more straight rights to the prone Trigg, it was lights out.

Despite a brief protest, Trigg eventually accepted his fate and congratulated Serra.

“I’m very happy,” Serra said after having his hand raised. “I really have a lot of respect for Frank; I really do. I’m not the prettiest guy on the pads, but I got the job done.”

Serra (10-6 MMA, 7-6 UFC) wins for the first time since his stunning April 2007 win over current UFC welterweight champ Georges St-Pierre. Meanwhile, Trigg (19-8 MMA, 2-5 UFC has now lost two-straight contests and has hinted at a potential retirement.

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